Zahnd has studied the rise and fall of Christian civilizations; he understands that, as the Book of Ecclesiastes tells us, “there is nothing new under the sun.” Still, it’s hard for him to accept just how quickly this particular American experiment went south. When he created Word of Life Church at age twenty-two, riding high on the generational momentum of the Jesus Movement, he was convinced that the United States was experiencing a real-time revival. Forty years later, he is witnessing the sort of crash that will be studied by pastors in the centuries to come. “I think about it every day. I
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